Metabolic syndrome is a very common metabolic disorder resulting from having chronically high insulin levels. Metabolic syndrome is characterized by obesity, high blood pressure, diabetes, and heart disease. Many of your laboratory tests will be abnormal if you have metabolic syndrome including high triglycerides, low HDL (“good cholesterol”), high insulin levels, elevated Hg A1C and lab tests consistent with fatty liver. Metabolic syndrome is a result of you consuming a diet with too many carbohydrates (starches, sugars and starchy vegetables) over an extended period of time. Eventually your pancreas (the organ that secretes insulin) will have to work overtime to try to process these carbohydrates. If you have high insulin levels for too long, after a while your insulin will stop working and you will develop metabolic syndrome. Essentially this means that you have developed a resistance to your own insulin and are suffering the metabolic consequences of your unhealthy diet. This condition is also commonly referred to as “pre-diabetes”. Other names for metabolic syndrome are insulin resistance, hyperinsulinism, dysinsulinism and pre-diabetes.
Regardless of what you call this unhealthy constellation of problems, if you have chronically high insulin levels you will be at great risk for developing diabetes, obesity, high blood pressure, heart disease, strokes, cancer, depression, thyroid disease and a bunch of other adverse health conditions.
Many people, including many doctors erroneously believe that if your blood sugar levels are under control than you are doing the best you can to reduce your chances of developing complications from type 2 diabetes.
The best and most important treatment for metabolic syndrome is to fix the cause of this problem, reducing your intake of sugars, starches and other carbohydrates. Any other treatment (like drugs, vitamins, herbs, amino acids and minerals) will only serve to cover up your symptoms and will eventually fail to help you.
